Once a Dream
by jackfreak123
Summary: She came to this world beaten, battered, and born anew, and still managed to revive a broken man. He found her on the forest floor among his own destination-less wandering, and ended up discovering one within her.


This is a prelude for what im hoping to be a several chapter long fic. I'm praying that writers block doesn't screw me over again. I'm getting sick of stalling in posting this so im gonna go ahead and post this on here, hoping that might kick my ass into gear.

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_There's a flash of a devious smile and a white light. Sophie opens her eyes again, a giggle trickling out of her throat easily and without any sort of effort, and that thought alone inspires another succession of them. She hears a resounding thump behind her and turns to find Link sprawled out on the ground in the most ungraceful position she's ever seen him._

_He smiled at her wistfully. Link's eyes had a habit of lighting up with each smile and the shade of blue that happiness transformed his eyes into had a sort of breathless effect on Sophie and her giggles faltered._

"_Who knew climbing trees was this hard, huh?" he says, and Sophie reaches down a hand to help him up._

"_Well excuse me for trying to teach you how to do something useful for once, Oh Wonderful Hero of Time,"_

_Link eyes her outstretched hand for a moment, and his smile turns devious. "Yes, 'trying' being the keyword here." He grabs her hand and yanks her down onto the ground next to him, and the air around them is filled with their laughter. The dirt and rocks from the forest floor scrape against her knees but she doesn't care. She rolls over on top of him, legs resting on each side of his chest, punching him playfully. Their laughter continues but dims slightly as their eyes lock._

_Suddenly, she feels hands on her legs, and they begin to slide up her skin until resting on her hips. His smile turns playful and his eyes darken. "I know plenty of useful things."_

_She punches him again, her fists remaining propped up on his chest. "You know," she says, "I've been thinking-"_

"_Which was a poor idea from the start," Link interrupts, quickly covering his face with his arms in order to block her attacks._

_Sophie rolls her eyes but continues. "As I was saying," she says, looking down at him pointedly. "We've been staying here with the Kokiri for some time now, and…" she trails off, her eyes shyly avoiding his._

_Link's eyebrows shoot up nearly to the edge of his hairline and Sophie has the sudden urge to twirl his blonde bangs with her fingers. "And?" he asks, his curiosity piqued._

_She hesitates, thinking over her next words. "It's beautiful here, don't get me wrong. And the kids here are amazing; maybe a pain in the ass sometimes, but amazing nonetheless. And the Lost Woods is more spectacular than I ever could have imagined, and I'm definitely gonna miss the little skull kid twerps, and-"_

_Sophie pauses as she feels Link's hands make a slow trail up her back to her shoulders, his thumbs rubbing little circles there through her layers of clothing. "Is there a point in all this or do you plan on torturing me the rest of the day?" he asks, his voice having a playful tone to it._

_She hums under her breath, gathering one of his hands and holding it against her cheek before kissing it, smiling against his skin. "Well it would help if you'd stop distracting me," she mumbles, feeling Link pulling her face down towards him, both of their eyes closing slightly. She loves being with him like this: just the two of them in the forest, with her draped across his lap and Link cradling her face in between his hands, looking into her eyes with an expression that Sophie once would have described as 'love,' but is now too afraid to._

_Sophie is scared of many things, but something about his presence just makes all of her fears seem so distant. 'Forever' feels now like such a short amount of time with this man._

_She leans down even more, rubbing her cheek against his and kissing a pointed ear. His hands slide under the back of her shirt and it's his skin on her skin and suddenly it's all she can think about, all she wants to think about._

_Sophie feels his breathy laugh against her neck, and she leaves a trail of kisses from his ear, across his jaw, to his chin. "Who's the one being distracting now?" he says, his voice deeper than before and Sophie feels the words rumble through his chest and it makes her want to curl up against him like a cat and lounge across his chest as if she had every right to._

"_You started it," she breathes. Link's eyes close at the sound and Sophie leans down towards his mouth for a kiss. And it's wonderful, just like it always is. He has a woodsy smell, like the grass and the forest he grew up in, and it's a very comforting smell. He is home. He is safety. He is her protection and her life and her love._

_Link's mouth opens under hers. His tongue curls against her lips begging for entrance, and she grants it. She sighs against his mouth at the sensation, curling into his embrace even more than before, and feels his arms tightening around her._

_Sophie pulls back. "Wait," she says, "What I was talking about earlier… there actually was a point to it all and it-it's really important." She inwardly cringes at her stuttering, but nerves tend to bring back old habits._

_Link cracks his eyes open begrudgingly, blue eyes staring at her with his mouth swollen slightly. Taking in the sight of him stretched out on the ground under her is almost enough to stop her. Almost._

_She takes a deep breath, wills all of her courage. "I want to travel. I want to go to Zora's Domain, and see the Gorons at Death Mountain. I want to visit Castle Town and Kakarioko but mostly, I just want to go anywhere you're willing to take me." Link's eyes widen slightly, eyebrows shooting up to his hairline again and the hands on her back freeze in their tracks._

_At the look of surprise on his face, she looks away. "I-if that's okay with you, I mean."_

_She sits back up and swipes away a brown curl that had fallen into her face. "I mean, I know you probably have tons of other things to do, and all, but I just thought that I could maybe tag along."_

_She hears him sigh below her. "Sophie-"_

"_I know, I know. You don't think it's safe for me out there." She pauses. "Yeah, it's dangerous, but who cares? I'll have you there to protect me and I pretty much know where everything is but what's a video game when you can see it in person, right?"_

"_Sophie, it's-"_

_She continues on as if he never spoke. "If you get tired of protecting me (and I don't know about you but I'm getting pretty tired of being the cliché damsel in distress) you can just teach me how to fight and everything'll be good."_

_She looks down. "Well, probably not _good_ but at least better than-" Link covers her mouth with one hand, and she notices for the first time in all of her rambling that the blue of his eyes have a gentle hue._

_His hands move to cradle her head once more, and Sophie feels more vulnerable now than ever. "Sophie…" his voice is soft, quiet, and his expression makes it almost seem as if he's hurt somehow, eyebrows creasing together, with concerned eyes. "Why are you so hesitant to mention this to me?"_

_She sighs, looking away from him once more. "I don't know," she breathes, and she feels him start to play with her hair, finding comfort in his soothing touches. "I'm tired of always weighing you down, I guess."_

_Fingers under her chin turn her to him, and she's lost. "Is that what this is about?" He asks her, his eyes looking into hers as if searching for something__, some unspoken thought that she's hidden. "You think you're a burden?" Whatever he finds, it hardens his expression slightly, his mouth tightens and she feels guilty for some reason._

"_You have seen yourself as a burden this whole time while I consider you a companion, my equal. Sophie," he sighs, "you may not see your importance but I am reminded of it every time I look at you. Your smile keeps me upright; your presence gives me hope. Your laughter reminds me why I'm fighting in the first place."_

_Link pauses but his expression looks no less determined. He opens his mouth to continue, but hesitates, as if the words halted suddenly on the edge of his tongue. He shakes his head, "No, if I do not tell you this, you'll never understand." Sophie prepares for the worst, and refuses to hope, but she feels it clinging onto her heart with a death grip anyway._

_And she comes to a realization: despite her denial and several attempts at resistance and self-preservation, he has held her heart within his grasp for a while now. But instead of terrifying her like that same aspect normally would, she finds herself longing to give as much of herself to him as possible._

_His voice drags her from her thoughts and back to their current situation. "For some unknown reason you seem to desire to share my burdens," Link says, "I was reluctant to share them with you, at first, because I would wish the fate of the world on no one. But I relented. Not because I was willing to give my destiny away to someone else, but because you took them anyway. You refused to listen to me; you're stubborn, ridiculously hard-headed, relentless when you know what must be done, merciless one moment and compassionate the next…"_

_He takes another breath, and then continues. Sophie can't find it within herself to look away. "You saw me as I really am: caught in a cycle of fate with no one to turn to, no one to help me. You saw through my initial attempts at pushing people away and gave me the friendship that I truly needed."_

_She cringes at that word, 'friendship,' and looks away. His hands bring her gaze back to him again, and she can't hide the stinging pain of hurt that she's feeling. "You misunderstand," his eyes are soft and search hers, gazes of a deep blue shifting back and forth through shades of tobacco brown and she doesn't feel invaded like she normally would._

"_Any other person would have figured this out by now, Sophie," Link says, smiling slightly, and it's the sort of smile that tugs on her heart strings, the same strings that she attempted to snip away years ago, but have apparently made a reappearance because of him._

_He brings her face closer, eyes still searching hers for something, anything. Sophie doesn't know what to do, so she just gazes back, glancing down at those swollen lips of his and longing to kiss them again, anything to stop this particular topic that their conversation has strayed to._

"_Do you have any idea what I'm talking about?" He breathes, still looking at her. "Anything at all?"_

_She sighs, and she refuses to let the words come out. "I-I do, yes, but I don't want to…. I don't want to…"_

"_You don't want to what?" Link mumbles, voice growing quiet, and his eyes drift down to her lips also. She feels his breath against her mouth and she grazes a kiss against his softly, gently, lovingly._

_Instead of seeing his smile, she feels it against her lips. "You can kiss me but you cant say the words aloud?" He sighs, "now where's the fairness in that?"_

_At that, she leans back just far enough for him to kiss along her jawline, and her breath falters, heart skipping a beat. "I think that… well, I think that maybe you…. That you might…"_

_His kisses continue, " Yes, yes, you almost have it."_

_She tilts her head to the side, turning to face him, eyes locking with his. " I think that you might possibly… love me."_

_Link smirks, and the skin on her back prickles from his touch as his hands slide down from their place to rest on her hips, his hands grasping and caressing. She leans into his touch unthinkingly, longingly, and she's barely able to keep up this train of thought._

"_You just think?" He says teasingly. "You don't know for sure?"_

_She shakes her head, and his hands move lower, under the waistband of the back of her shorts, and he grasps at the skin there, making her sigh. "No, I do. I do know," she says breathlessly, her eyes closing._

"_Mhhmmm," he groans under his breath, "And what is it you know, lovely Sophie?" Links hands move to the front of her shirt now, roaming freely, teasing her breasts through the fabric of her bra and chuckling darkly as she sighs again._

_At this point, it's taking all of her concentration just to be able to process any thoughts but the first and only coherent word coming from her mouth is his name in another breathy sigh, and she arches into his touch. "Link, she breathes," and one hand continues its ministrations while the other heads south toward the waistline of her shorts once more and even further down, causing her to squirm in his lap._

"_Yes, beautiful? Tell me. Tell me what you know. Tell me." His fingers have now made it past the barrier of her underwear and Sophie can barely keep her eyes open._

_She moans, and his fingers speed up their pace. "You love me," she says, breaths coming faster as his fingers increase their speed. "You love me!"_

_Link groans and pulls her down for a kiss, his fingers never slowing, her brown curls framing his face below her as she kisses him back, just as desperate. The kiss is wild, tongues battling while each simultaneously giving into one another, submitting to the desire and love that has no longer gone unspoken between them. And Sophie comes apart in his arms, their limbs tangled, and moaning into his mouth, with his hands never ceasing to roam every part of her in his reach._

_They lay there like that for a while, with her head resting in the crook of his neck and shoulder, lips scattering the occasional kiss. The both of them lie there, curled up against each other, admiring the serenity and sudden quiet of the forest; as if the area around them knew the importance of that moment, and let the two lovers have their peace. Sophie had never felt more at home than she did now, with Link's arms around her, and her face pressed against his neck._

_Then, it dawned on her. "You love me," she breathed, sitting up to look at him. "You really love me."_

_Link just smiled, the blue of his eyes lighting up again, and Sophie felt some weight shift inside of her that she hadn't even realized was there. "Yes," he said, her heart clenching within the confines of her chest, and her breath catches in her throat. "I really do."_

_And that was that. She gave him the support he needed to keep going, and he opened her eyes to the strength that has been inside her all along. Link reminded her how to love, taught her how to reopen her soul and trust again. Sophie had a different role to play but still held no less importance. She made him laugh, made him smile again, gave him a purpose when all meaning to exist and happiness fled him; replaced doubt with determination, replenished his desire to experience and live life how it was meant to be lived, rather than meet the requirements of his destiny and simply be done with it._

_She came to this world beaten, battered, and born anew, and still managed to revive a broken man. He found her on the forest floor amongst his own destination-less wandering, and ended up discovering one within her._

_And they will live. She will help him fulfill his destiny, and he'll be there to help guide through her own. And they'll make it. Except this time, with the ending, there won't be a subsequent sense of doubt, depression, or loneliness. Because they will be together. _


End file.
